As stated in an article from the Economic Policy Institute: “A $15 minimum wage would begin to reverse decades of growing pay inequality between the most underpaid workers and workers receiving close to the median wage, particularly along gender and racial lines. For example, minimum wage increases in the late 1960s explained 20% of the decrease in the Black–white earnings gap in the years that followed, whereas failures to adequately increase the minimum wage after 1979 account for almost half of the increase in inequality between women at the middle and bottom of the wage distribution.
The Guilfordian
February 5, 2021
In 2019, the U.S. Department of Labor investigated about one thousand cases of agricultural wage theft, according to the Economic Policy Institute. More than 200,000 workers traveled to the U.S. that year on H-2A visas, and some of their advocates believe wage-theft incidents are much higher.
Public News Service
February 5, 2021
Ben Zipperer, an economist at the Economic Policy Institute, said minimum wage raises are exceptionally popular among the public. A 2019 Pew Research Survey found that two-thirds of Americans supported raising the minimum wage to $15.
Business Insider
February 5, 2021
In Indiana, the minimum wage for tipped employees is $2.13 an hour. If tips combined with hourly wage is less than $7.25, then the employer is required to make up the difference. However, a report published by the Economic Policy Institute in 2014 found widespread violation of this requirement.
The Exponent
February 5, 2021
Meanwhile, Battle and others worry that Black professionals are more likely to experience layoffs during the crisis than their white counterparts. Even in a strong economy, Black workers with college degrees are more likely to be unemployed than white workers with a similar education, according to the Economic Policy Institute.
SHRM
February 5, 2021
Policymakers can look to the recent past to better understand the need for public sector investments and job quality protections. An analysis from the Economic Policy Institute shows that the economic recovery following the Great Recession was significantly slower as a result of federal aid to state and local governments drying up too early.19 Unsurprisingly, cities and states were more successful at maintaining public jobs when aid was longer-term and included job retention requirements.20 Indeed, policymakers can help ensure that working families benefit by making needed investments in the public sector now.
- Olugbenga Ajilore, “White men are doing mostly fine without more economic relief from Washington, but just about everyone else is suffering,” MarketWatch, October 30, 2020, available at https://www.marketwatch.com/story/white-men-are-doing-mostly-fine-without-more-economic-relief-from-washington-but-just-about-everyone-else-is-suffering-11604069374#; Michael Madowitz, Anne Price, and Christian E. Weller, “Public Work Provides Economic Security for Black Families and Communities” (Washington: Center for American Progress, 2020), available at https://www.americanprogress.org/issues/economy/reports/2020/10/23/492209/public-work-provides-economic-security-black-families-communities/; Jeffrey Keefe, “Public-sector workers are paid less than their private-sector counterparts—and the penalty is larger in right-to-work states,” Economic Policy Institute, January 14, 2016, available at https://www.epi.org/publication/public-sector-workers-are-paid-less-than-their-private-sector-counterparts-and-its-much-worse-in-right-to-work-states/.
- David Cooper, “Without federal aid, many state and local governments could make the same budget cuts that hampered the last economic recovery,” Economic Policy Institute, May 27, 2020, available https://www.epi.org/blog/without-federal-aid-many-state-and-local-governments-could-make-the-same-budget-cuts-that-hampered-the-last-economic-recovery/.
Center for American Progress
February 5, 2021
Ben Zipperer, an economist at the liberal Economic Policy Institute, told Insider such an impact would be minimal, at worst, and arguably beneficial to businesses as well as workers, with higher wages reducing costly employee turnover.
Business Insider
February 5, 2021
“To be candid, I think that his affiliation with the building trades serves him well in the confirmation process because those nominees do tend to fare a little bit better than other labor-affiliated nominees,” said Celine McNicholas, director of government affairs at the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute. “It’s an area where Republicans are not automatically a ‘no.’”
Bloomberg Law
February 5, 2021
TANF recipients looking for work in the current pandemic face even worse prospects than parents in the studies reported here, so it is even more important that states consider ways to improve their TANF work programs. Women, people of color, and lower-income workers make up disproportionate shares of the employment sectors most deeply harmed by the pandemic. According to data compiled by the Economic Policy Institute, the employment decline in the pandemic was twice as large for Black and Latina women as for white women and men. (See Figure 4.)
Economic Policy Institute, “Chart: A more comprehensive look at employment losses among women,” October 20, 2020, https://www.epi.org/chart/gender-disparities-figure-a-a-more-comprehensive-look-at-employment-losses-among-women-change-in-employment-population-ratio-by-gender-race-ethnicity-feb-to-sept-2020/?utm_source=Economic+Policy+Institute&utm_campaign=a9e285a531-.
Center on Budget and Policy Priorities
February 5, 2021